When It Comes To Tech, Keeping Up With Your Kids Isn’t Easy

Many parents are introduced to the latest technology only after their kids have discovered it and have been using it for quite some time. With busy work schedules of their own, add kids’ activities and household responsibilities, it’s tough for parents to be truly caught up with everything their kids are doing.

Technology tends to fall into the downtime category for most. When parents need a break, kids need to unwind, and everyone is looking to spend a little time doing absolutely nothing, the tablets, TVs, smartphones, and video games come out to play. Parents used to be the ones who had to teach their kids what to do with all these gadgets. In 2008, parents were still considered more tech savvy than their kids. Enter the iGeneration. The kids who grew up with it all.

The kids know it all, parents know some. Whether trying to keep up-to-date with the latest technology, or making sure parents are aware of what their kids are doing, now is a great time to set resolutions to learn the latest. The perfect time to master new skills and polish old ones. For parents looking to keep up with the kids, these tips can help make that a reality.

Set Expectations

Just like New Year’s Resolutions, it’s important to know exactly what the goal is; maybe it’s to be able to play on the newest gaming system right alongside teenagers, or just to know exactly how to set parental privacy settings. There are countless goals to achieve so being able to pinpoint exactly what is trying to be accomplished is half the battle.

Sure, parents can say they want to know everything about everything, but that isn’t realistic. Recent research found that 92 percent of people who set New Year’s goals never actually achieve them. Specificity leads to better performance 90 percent of the time.

Search For Tutorials

A quick YouTube search will give step-by-step instructions on how to do just about everything. It will also find a few videos (like this one) that show just how funny parents can be when trying to keep up with their kids.

One of the biggest technologies gifted over the holidays was virtual reality. If VR made its way into the home, it was probably something that the kids got to right away. It was set up with ease. Parents possibly tried reading the directions and then just let their kids take it for a spin. But, technology doesn’t have to be handed off immediately. Spend under two and a half minutes watching the View-Master set up and get put into action.

Use It

Chances are the latest technology won’t be something that’s quickly returned to the store. Unlike clothes, it’s almost always a perfect fit and exactly what was asked for. So, if parents want to know what’s going on, they need to use it.

Parents should go ahead and preload apps to their kid’s smartphone so they know exactly what is being used. Then, parents can download those same apps on their own phones. If kids are using Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, the best way for parents to know what they’re doing and understand what it’s used for is by using it themselves. Explore the app’s capabilities, discover what hashtags mean by clicking on them and seeing what others have posted. Sometimes it’s not what’s expected.

There is so much new technology that it’s nearly impossible to know how it all works. But, if kids are using it on a daily basis, it’s important for parents to know about it too. Whether for safety reasons or just to further connect as a family, keeping up with the kids and technology is a necessary skill for all parents to have.